I am embarrassed. I have a friend 50ish guy, has lived in China 15y and speaks 2 Chinese languages fluently. He comes to Thai 3 times a yr for 3w at a time. After about 3 years of this he can carry on conversations quite easily. Everyday he takes lessons, not from certified teachers but from bar girls, girlfriends, waitresses etc--he says it is easy.

Some people are gifted that way; good ear, good memory and big left brain.

I'm learning Thai as well... Every where I've looked people are alway want to learn, cos they want to know what girls are saying about them 55555 I'm the same, many of times I think people are talking about me in a negative way, n would love just 2 listen to what they say hehe, but I don't think I only want to learn cos of that... I think it will make life much easy, when u can understand the Thais...
I'm taking one 2 hour lesson aweek, also I have an app on my phone with a lot of word that will more than get you by.... U have YouTube and defo get that book by benjawan poomsan Becker Thai for beginners, crack the tones and long and short words, and up be half way there.... Remember it's about how much time u put in your self, the more you study the quicker it will be...

Communicating in Thailand is not that hard really usually with wives , girlfriends and bar staff most have a limited but adequate amounted of English , as also the same for me with my limited Thai vocabulary when in conversation ,the same can be said when going to Thai markets,tradespeople etc if you know some basic Thai and say it with a smile (which goes a long way) you will find people will go out of their way to help you, it's fun also as well as adding few words to your vocabulary. If you are dealing with banks , lawyers etc they are usually very fluent in English in my experience.
One thing for sure is mandatory; you need to know how to count in Thai that is for sure